by
Moe Min

RELIGION

2007

HARD COVER

128 PAGES

This beautiful, illustrated portrait of monuments, monasteries and rituals is both a striking visual overview of Buddhism as practiced in Burma and a splendid introduction to the country. (BMA52, $30.00)

by
Lonely Planet

by
Naomi Duguid

FOOD

2012

HARD COVER

364 PAGES

A culinary adventurer, Duguid presents the food, local markets, people and culture of Burma in this exceedingly informative (not to mention beautiful) cookbook and cultural guide. The 125 recipes are interspersed with tales and photographs from her many travels in the region. (BMA77, $35.00)

by
Maryvelma O'Neil

by
Aung San Suu Kyi
|
Michael Aris

CULTURAL PORTRAIT

2010

PAPER

416 PAGES

This collection of speeches, letters and interviews by and about Burma's Nobel Prize-winning human rights leader, edited by her late husband and with forewords by Vaclav Havel and Desmond Tutu, provides essential background to her role in Burmese politics and the situation of the country today. (BMA08, $17.00)

by
Aung San Suu Kyi

HISTORY

2010

PAPER

244 PAGES

A collection of about 50 candid and moving mini-essays on Burmese culture, daily life and politics written by the country's iconic Nobel Prize-winning human-rights leader who was held under house arrest by the military junta for many years. (BMA49, $16.00)

by
Thant Myint-U

HISTORY

2007

PAPER

388 PAGES

In this stimulating and important book, Myint-U (grandson of the late UN Secretary General U Thant and author of The Making of Modern Burma) uses Burmese history as a lens for understanding Myanmar today. (BMA51, $16.00)

by
Wendy Law-Yone

BIOGRAPHY/MEMOIR

2014

HARD COVER

336 PAGES

Wendy Law-Yone, daughter of exiled newspaper proprietor Ed Law-Yone recreates her father's struggles to create a democratic government in Burma in the 1960s, providing insight into Burmese life and the politics that became a family affair. (BMA84, $35.00)

by
Emma Larkin

TRAVEL NARRATIVE

2006

PAPER

304 PAGES

An American journalist fluent in Burmese, Emma Larkin (a pseudonym) masterfully interweaves her travels in the footsteps of the British colonial officer and writer with interviews and an astute, moving history of modern Burma. (BMA40, $17.00)

by
Guy Delisle

BIOGRAPHY/MEMOIR

2010

PAPER

272 PAGES

Posted to Burma with his Doctors Without Borders wife and young son, Delisle captures the absurdities, challenges and routines of everyday life in Burma in bold black-and-white panels in this droll graphic travelogue, his third. (BMA58, $16.95)

by
Peter Popham

BIOGRAPHY/MEMOIR

2013

PAPER

334 PAGES

Peter Popham's timely biography follows the arc of Suu Kyi's life from her childhood in Rangoon, formative years in India and Oxford, marriage to Michael Aris and her return to Burma, where she has become a potent symbol for the Burmese people. The British journalist doesn't dodge from Suu Kyi's moral decision to remain in Burma, even as her husband was dying in 1999, and her children Alexander and Kim remained behind in Britain. (BMA79, $16.95)

by
Rory MacLean
|
William Dalrymple

TRAVEL NARRATIVE

2008

PAPER

224 PAGES

MacLean's perceptive and heartbreaking portrait of contemporary Burma, originally published in 1999, focuses on the ordinary people he met on travels from Rangoon and Mandalay to Pagan and the Golden Triangle. (BMA56, $17.00)

by
Botan
|
Susan Fulop Kepner

LITERATURE

2002

PAPER

350 PAGES

HARD TO FIND ELSEWHERE

A prize-winning novel, first published in 1969 and here newly translated into English. Taking the form of a series of letters back home to his mother, the novel follows the fate of Tan Suang U, a Chinese immigrant in Bangkok at the close of World War II, who marries, raises a family and runs a successful business. The novel, among its many pleasures, depicts daily life in Bangkok's thriving Chinatown. (TLD45, $19.95)

by
Daniel Mason

LITERATURE

2003

PAPER

336 PAGES

In this transporting first novel, a mild-mannered tradesman is seduced by late Victorian Burma. Mason's complex, absorbing tale dives into the world of 19th-century colonial Burma, its traditions, trappings, personalities and politics. (BMA31, $15.95)

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